As the U.S. remains at war with Iran, the Pentagon’s fiscal year 2027 budget request has raised the prospect of a significant increase in the monthly stipend paid out to troops in regions that put them at risk of taking hostile fire or other job-related dangers.
As first reported by Stars and Stripes, Army and Air Force budget request breakdowns describe increases to the extra pays earned by troops in harm’s way. Service members can earn either hostile fire pay or imminent danger pay, but not both. The payments are based on location and are calculated by the day — $7.50 per day up to a maximum of $225 per month.
Documents explaining the Air Force budget request describe allocations for “increases for military special and incentive pay, including hostile fire/imminent danger pay.”
While the service does not further detail the increase within budget justification documents, it does add that the Pentagon has “increased Hostile Fire Pay and Imminent Danger Pay rates to the maximum statutory threshold,” effective as of the start of Fiscal Year 2027.
According to U.S. Code, that maximum for those in hostile fire areas is $450 per month — double the current ceiling of $225.
The Army, in its documentation, describes hostile fire or imminent danger pay that “may not exceed $450 per month.”
A Pentagon official, who asked not to be named, said the Department of Defense had yet to commit to increasing pays for hazardous duties.
“The department continuously evaluates its policies to ensure that they are advancing its mission,” the official told Military Times. “At this time, no decision has been made to increase the current rates for hostile fire event or imminent danger pay.”
Meanwhile, a review commissioned through the last defense budget may result in the designation of even more regions as eligible for the stipend soon.
The Fiscal Year 2026 National Defense Authorization Act, signed into law last December, mandated a review of the list of areas eligible for danger pay, as maintained by the Defense Finance and Accounting Service.
At the time, the last updates to the list were made in 2023, when the Bab-al-Mandeb Strait, Gaza Strip, Gulf of Aden, Red Sea and Ukraine were added.
The NDAA called for a 60-day review to begin no later than March 1, and began, for the first time, a routine review process that will consider the global conflict landscape every five years, beginning in 2031.
The current DFAS list includes 59 locations, some of them permanent and others provisional.
On Feb. 28, the list was updated to add 19 new regions, all of them connected to Operation Epic Fury, the U.S. campaign against the Iranian regime.
An appended note states that all these locations, from Diego Garcia to the Arabian Gulf, will keep their imminent danger designation until the end of the third month following the conclusion of the conflict. The designation could also extend to any follow-on operations directed by the president.
These additions do not appear to be linked to the NDAA-mandated review, however. Defense officials did not provide an update on that effort.
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